This summer we’re celebrating the first decade of Coro Lux, whose mission statement reads as follows: 

Coro Lux— the “Chorus of Light”— is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the preparation and performance of great choral music for the enrichment and delight of our audiences and ourselves, and to propagating love of the choral art in the next generation of singers.

We celebrate a decade of creating dozens of LIVE concerts. Music that’s not on a screen, not a recording, but live. Ten years of face to face engagement with the people of our city and state.

I.

And from humble beginnings, our non-profit has evolved into a “family of choruses” whose unofficial motto is “To do good as we do well.” 

For example, at least once a year we donate the proceeds of a concert to another worthy cause. In the past ten years at various times we’ve given concert proceeds to Healthcare for the Homeless, the NAACP College Scholarship Fund, Paws and Stripes, the ABQ Grief Center, the National Alliance of the Blind, and many others. 

You might wonder why one nonprofit should be helping another nonprofit. It’s because we believe in synergy. We believe in “win-win” situations and we know you do, too.

Along these same lines, our concerts often lift up issues we face in today’s society. One of my favorite sayings is: “Entertainment reinforces what we already believe. But Art makes us think thoughts we might not otherwise have had.”

And while we’ve certainly sung lots of things that everyone would call “art,” like Handel’s Messiah or Mozart’s Requiem, we’ve also introduced our audience to many new works, like Sir Karl Jenkins’s The Armed Man, which is a plea for peace, or the powerful work we’ll do again next fall, called Considering Matthew Shepard. Or our annual celebration of African American music, called FebFest, or A Place Called Home, about climate change, which we premiered in Carnegie Hall and repeated last month at the Lensic Theater in Santa Fe.

Through our concertizing we feel that we’re enriching lives and      sensitizing hearts and minds.

II.

We have great plans for the future. Next season is nearly all set (see elsewhere on this page), including one concert with a Pulitzer Prize winning composer and another with a multiple Grammy award winning conductor. 

In the fall we’ll embark on our first-ever FIVE YEAR PLAN. I’m delighted to say we’re beginning to attract individuals and businesses to serve as concert sponsors and we’re continuing to extend our efforts to bring the positive work of the El Faro Youth Chorus to more of our city’s young people.

But as you know, right now governmental funding agencies are pulling in their horns. And people are nervous about the future. Which is exactly the time when the messages of hope and community that we regularly deliver are needed the most.

Singing together brings disparate people into the same room, sitting next to one another while pursuing the same goals. Did you know that, after an hour of singing together, the people in the room start to have the same heartbeat? Their bodies literally come into sync. Astounding!

III.

The Coro Lux family of choruses provide something that’s badly needed today. Instead of each of us pulling up our drawbridge, listening to our own preferred variety of news, and shutting out the world with our headsets on, Coro Lux is out there giving live concerts, making strangers into friends the world a better place, one 1/8th-note at a time. 

In order to do this, we need funds. What we do is pretty cheap, but it isn’t free. We need sheet music, we need to pay pianists and hire orchestras, to rent rehearsal space, and to hire busses to bring the El Faro kids into practice. You get the idea.

We’re seeking gifts of all sizes but now— after ten years of growth— we’re also laying the groundwork for transformational gifts. We seek gifts of 5, 6 and even 7 figures that will make it possible for us to thrive and grow, expanding our reach and bringing this much-needed work out to a society that’s in danger of being trapped inside its own echo chamber. 

If you can help, please go to our “Donate” button. Or for discussions concerning larger gifts, write me at ellingboe@abqcorolux.org. 

IV.

During our most recent FebFest, we welcomed Dr. Brandon Boyd to New Mexico. Brandon is an expert on choral music of the African-American tradition. He taught us that in this music we hear not only joy, but also the heartache of what was a crushing existence for those enslaved people. Yet through the power of music, they could sing through the pain and find a way to hope for a more joyful tomorrow.

And after we sang A Place Called Home, whose central theme is one of care for the earth, I received many messages. I’d like to share a few of them here:

I just wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed the concert.The music was beautiful and the message was a much needed one.I teared up a few times. [I’m] Trying to balance my mental health with standing up for what’s right.Thanks for giving me a moment of respite from the chaos.

There are not enough words to describe the deep emotions [you all] …elicited in me during your performance. The tears wouldn’t stop when you dropped your baton as the singers implored us to “Go…Go”, and I thank you for the renewed hope I feel that others care just as much as I do about the amazing world God has entrusted to us to enjoy, yes, but not to abuse. I will keep going with that blessing to guide me.

Along those same lines, here’s one last quote from an audience member:

The piece seemed not written or composed, but rather, a gift that emerged whole, as if fused somehow by a force from which sprung an ethereal spirit of love, of community and, most overwhelmingly, of hope. And what a holy gift that is amid the chaos we all fear. To hope again is to live again. And for that I offer my deepest gratitude

The power of singing is the power to change hearts and minds. It’s the power to bring comfort and hope where it’s most needed, and to make friends of strangers. Thank you for supporting Coro Lux. Here’s to the next decade!

Warmly,

Brad

Bradley Ellingboe

Founder and Artistic Director

Coro Lux — an auditioned chorus — has a generous scholarship program meant to help ALL who need financial help to participate, particularly those who are in the midst of, or who have recently finished, their schooling.

 For information about joining our chorus or contributing to our 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, please email info@abqcorolux.org.